“Did you hear me?” he said.
“Do you want a medal?” she said to him.
He pulled at his collar. “I was losing Asha. Everything I swore to remember, her voice, her scent, it was gone, but I remembered everything about you and I hated myself for it.”
Inwardly, I groaned. It was heartbreaking about Asha, but he couldn’t have phrased his feelings for Leo worse if he’d scripted it.
Leo didn’t bother keeping her disgust to herself. “You won’t have to remember anything about me anymore.”
Rohan strode onto the stage, accompanied by the studio musicians who’d played on the album, including Zack on piano.
When Zack saw me, he smiled, his white teeth flashing against his black skin. He’d shaved his goatee, exposing a strong jawline, his lean frame looking all relaxed in a skinny suit.
I blew him a kiss.
Zack caught it and pressed it to his cheek. Rohan rolled his eyes.
The crowd went wild to see their main attraction, but I was way more fascinated by the drama unfolding here in front of me.
“I want to spend the rest of my life proving I’m worthy of you. Leonie. Bella.” Drio implored her to look at him, but Leo watched the stage like it was the most fascinating thing in the world.
Drio’s shoulders slumped. He backed away, but I yanked him back beside me.
“You kept her from Gog and Magog, which was a good start. This was a bit of a hash, but give it another try after the show.”
Rohan moved to the front of the stage and held up his hand for silence. “Thank you for coming. Tonight is very special to me. It’s the release of my first solo album.” More cheers. “And it’s my cousin Asha’s birthday. For a long time, I couldn’t speak about what had happened to her. Not just because she was murdered by a demon, but because I physically couldn’t speak about it.”
Dev put his arm around Maya.
Leo glanced at Drio, her features troubled.
I squeezed his hand. He squeezed back. Would wonders never cease?
“But then I met this woman,” Rohan said.
A lot of good natured “ooohs.” I blushed.
“Don’t let Nava know,” Danilo called out.
“I told you to keep him off the guest list,” Cisco said.
Rohan smiled down at me and I waited for all the lovely compliments about to flow my way.
“She bullied me into getting healthy about my feelings.”
I laughed.
“That meant making music again. These six songs represent my story over these past few years. I hope you enjoy them.” He nodded at the band.
The coolest thing about this album was not just the story as a journey, but the music as one, too. Both the story and the album started with “Asp,” a haunting ballad about a brutal loss and the venom that pierced Rohan’s soul that night. Zack played in a minor key for a soulful eight bars, one of the musicians on violin joined in and Rohan began to sing. There were no other instruments.
The song segued straight into “Age of Consent,” which built on the lush evocativeness of “Asp,” adding in driving percussion. The song wasn’t about sex, it was an exploration of Rohan’s anger, how he hadn’t given his consent for this tragedy.
“Tourniquet of Phrase” had that same dark thread, but cool electronic backbeats were looped through it, giving it the sense of a person lost in a labyrinth, hitting dead ends. That impression was heightened with Rohan singing of his descent into musical silence, the void that decimated his creativity.
Under Maya’s keen producer’s ear, every song grew richer and more layered, while still keeping true to elements of the previous song. It reminded me of tap improv exercises where someone would dance eight bars and then the next person would have to weave that into their own eight and so on. Even though the tone and rhythm of the songs changed, there was a consistency of flavor to them.
Most people would not consider racking up demon kills a “Silver Lining” to their grief, but most people weren’t Rohan. That song evoked shades of Green Day’s “Boulevard of Broken Dreams” but sped up, edgy and raw. With a horn section. It was wild and shouldn’t have worked, but Maya’s infallible sense of how to guide the tune paired with Rohan’s fight with his inner and outer demons was breathtaking.
Rohan sang “Slay,” the fifth song on his album, directly to me. How different this performance was from the one in Prague when I’d tortured myself watching him sing “Toccata and Fugue” to Lily. Once again I found myself stealing glances at her, but to make sure that she was okay with this public declaration. I needn’t have bothered. She was so wrapped up in Marcus, I doubted she remembered who was onstage.
The tightness in my ribcage loosened and I lost myself in his ode to our love.
“I told Rohan not to fuck things up with you.”
I did a double-take at Drio, who nodded gravely. “Does this mean we’re friends again?” I said.
“Perhaps.” He turned away, but I caught his small smile.
Ro sang the last line of “Slay.” I mouthed “bliss” at him and blew him a kiss, which he caught and pressed to his heart.
Zack rolled his eyes.
I held onto Leo so I wouldn’t float away.
The song that surprised me the most when I’d first heard the album was “Rhapsody in You.” It was unabashedly hopeful, the horns in this one not a lament but a celebration.
Finally came the reprise of “Asp.” Again, it was only Zack, the violinist, and Rohan, but this version was in a major key. Rohan had laid his ghosts to rest, slain his demons, and moved into the light. It was an ode to Asha’s life.
The crowd was going ballistic before Rohan sang his final note. He grinned, but I could see the relief on his face that they liked it. Creatively, this had been important, but as the promise he’d kept to Asha, this album meant the world to him.
Rohan introduced the band to thunderous applause, especially for Zack, his former Fugue State Five bandmate.
Zack took his bow and then pulled Rohan front and center. “In case you don’t know this guy, his name is Rohan Mitra. Give it up for him!”
When Snowflake took his bow, the place literally shook from all the foot stomping and whistling.
Rohan crooked a finger at me, indicating I should join him in the green room.
Leo shoved at me. “Blech. Go have sex with the rock god that just adored you.”
“Works for me.”
Before I could leave, there was a loud squeal of feedback cutting over the mumbled “…good to be true.”
Drio stood on stage, the mic in a chokehold.
Everyone stared at him.
He cleared his throat and sang—or his warbled approximation of it—the next few lines to Leonie, who stood there twitching, her face frozen in a grimace and her brows creased.
It took me almost the entire first verse to figure out he was singing that old classic “Can’t Take My Eyes off of You.”
The band resumed their places and the drummer took up the tempo with a soft sweep of his drum brush. Zach chimed in on piano.
Drio kept singing, a tiny bit more relaxed now that the band was backing him up.
The look of death that Leo shot Ro when he picked up a tambourine to accompany Drio should have incinerated him on the spot. Ro beat the tambourine against his hip and gave her a crooked grin.
The horn section kicked it up for the chorus and the entire room belted out the words, helping to serenade Leo.
A grin split Drio’s face and he started hamming it up, picking up more confidence. Sadly, he didn’t pick up any type of singing ability or musicality. It was the worst, but it was also very much the best.
“For fuck’s sake,” Leo said.
I flung my arm around her, singing the chorus and forcing her to sway with me.
When Drio finished the song, he got almost as much applause as Rohan had. He jumped off the stage to stand before us.
“Was that a planned serenade?” I said.
&n
bsp; Drio shrugged. “Singing always worked for Ro to get the girl.”
“‘Always?’ What ‘always?’” I said.
Leo planted her hands on her hips. “You love me?”
“Sì?”
“This isn’t Jeopardy,” she said. “You don’t answer that in the form of a question.”
“Can we have some privacy?” Drio demanded of me.
“No.” I helped myself to a champagne flute. “Carry on.”
“I don’t need you to love me,” Leo said. “I’m never going to be Asha. But I do need you to respect me and care about me.”
“I don’t want you to be Asha. I want you to be you. Every beautiful inch of you.” He placed her hand on his heart. “Cuore mio.”
“Did you just call her ‘my heart?’” I did a happy dance.
Leo shoved me away. “Go now.”
“My work here is done.” I went to find my rock star.
In truth, I ducked behind a pillar to spy on them.
Drio tipped Leo’s chin up. He gave her a smile so brilliant, so infused with happiness and so unlike anything I’d ever seen from him, that it stole my pervy little breath away. He leaned down and planted a very sweet, short kiss on Leo.
I dropped the flute. Whoa. He’d broken his “no kissing” rule. This was epic.
Leo’s hands fluttered to her cheeks. Drio looked flustered, unsure of how to read her reaction, until she glowed up at him, rose on tiptoe, and kissed him back. Another peck like they were two thirteen-year-olds, both of them blushing. It was adorable beyond words.
Some dude in a hipster red suit and bow tie with platinum blond hair reminiscent of Ro’s hair back in his Fugue State Five Days approached me with a sniff. He looked me up and down and pronounced, “He could do better.” The man smiled at Lily, who didn’t register his existence.
“Nuh-uh.” Blair poked him backward with one red, manicured finger. “You did not diss my girl.”
“MainMitraMistress?” He nodded at my guess. “Meet Blair. Blair, this is Ro’s super fan. Total Lily shipper who’s been pinging my stalker radar tonight. Defend my honor well, Padawan.”
I left them to the Battle of the Blonds and crossed the parquet floor.
A DJ took the stage, putting on “Rather Be” by Clean Bandit and people drifted onto the dance floor. Kane and Ari led the crowd, lost in each other. Baruch was even dancing with Clara, the two of them drifting closer and closer.
I caught Rohan as he came out of the green room, sweaty, flushed, and high off his performance. He’d lost the jacket and was down to his black tank top.
“You might have a career in music ahead of you,” I said.
“Maybe get lucky, get some gigs playing cafés.”
“I mean, don’t quit the day job or anything until you can establish a fan base, but you’re pretty good at this.”
“Rather Be” ramped up, the audience jumping up and down around us, dancing in unabashed glee. Colored lights swirled. The room was alive, electric.
Once upon a time, there’d been a girl with a dream whose world had burned down around her. She’d risen from those ashes shaky, living full-tilt because she was scared to stand still and just when she’d convinced herself that she’d propped herself up by driving everyone away, her world burned down again. She was forced to fight for her very existence in a new world that didn’t want her. But a funny thing happened. Instead of every blow shattering her, it made her stronger, more certain of who she was, what she wanted, and where she was going. So, when her world burned down for a third time, she was secure in her own skin. Her power was gone, but she was powerful. She looked around at the pieces of her life and thought, “This is enough. I am enough.”
“Whatcha thinking, Sparky?”
“It’s bliss time, Snowflake.” I reached for my boyfriend’s hand, and pulled him onto the dance floor, into our happily ever after.
Thank you for reading THE UNLIKEABLE DEMON HUNTER: BURN and for being a part of this crazy ride!
Dive into my snarky urban fantasy detective series: BLOOD & ASH (THE JEZEBEL FILES BOOK 1)
Cold-blooded kidnappers. Long-lost magic. When things get serious, she goes full Sherlock.
Ashira Cohen takes pride in being the only female private investigator in Vancouver. With her skills, her missing persons case should be a piece of cake.
She wasn’t counting on getting bashed in the skull, revealing a hidden tattoo and supernatural powers she shouldn’t possess.
Or the bitter icing on top: a spree of abductions and terrifying ghostly creatures on a deadly bender.
And don’t even get her started on the golems.
Reluctantly partnered with her long-time nemesis Levi, the infuriating leader of the magic community, Ash resolves to keep her focus on the clue trail and off their sexual tension because WTF is up with that?
But with a mastermind organization pulling strings from the shadows and Levi’s arrogance driving her to pick out his body bag, can Ash rescue the captives and uncover the truth or will the next blood spilled be her own?
CLICK HERE TO BUY BLOOD & ASH NOW >
OR
If you’re not ready to leave the fun of this world, join Leonie for her story in LEONIE HENDRICKS: DEMON P.I.
Got a dispute with another demon and killing them just won’t solve it? Leonie Hendricks gets results, no matter what the cost.
Even if her life-long internal battle with her non-human side is seriously taking its toll.
A new case throws Leonie back into the arms of the man who broke her heart. While she’d rather stab him and get on with her life, her professional principles demand that she hunt down her client’s fiendish assailant before innocent humans get caught in the crossfire.
But when things take a sinister turn, Leonie finds herself in a deadly fight not just for her heart, but for her very soul.
CLICK HERE TO BUY LEONIE HENDRICKS: DEMON P.I. NOW >
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Turn the page for an excerpt from Blood & Ash …
Excerpt from Blood & Ash
There was nothing like sitting in a shitty car with a broken heater covertly filming a teenager for cash to make me question my life choices.
My target, Charlotte Rose Scott, had taffy blonde hair, big blue eyes, and a manic enthusiasm that made me want to slip her an Ambien.
Not that I’d waste one on a child.
Her can-do spirit was currently being applied to a bit of breaking and entering. The sixteen-year-old had tried every point of entry on the ground floor of this weathered Craftsman house that was thirty-two blocks and worlds away from her own home. She’d graduated from tugging on the windows’ security bars to wobbling her way up a bare trellis to the second-story balcony.
Good to know all those gymnastics and dance classes of hers had a practical application. It was so hard to make it in the arts, but crime was always a growth industry.
I slapped another memory card into my Handycam, absently rubbing my right thigh. I’d been sitting out here in the damp cold for too long, exacerbating the dull ache from the rods holding my femur together, so I grabbed the Costco-sized bottle of Tylenol that I’d tossed on the passenger seat and dry-swallowed a couple of pills.
She wrenched on the sliding door handle and I winced. Leave a few more fingerprints, why don’t you? If it wouldn’t completely compromise my case, I’d show her how to break in myself and put us both out of our misery.
I zoomed in, ready to capture C.R. living her best truth. Or better yet, get some answers. Come on, you little adolescent fiend. Why the uncharacteristic foray into robbery? You’d even blown off piano lessons for this and you thrived in your overscheduled teenage existence.
What was I missing?
Denied entry, she shi
mmied back down the trellis to run at the solid back door. When she bounced off it with a yelp, only one of us was surprised.
Spare me from amateurs.
I dug my buzzing phone out of my hip pocket. My best friend and part-time employee, Priya Khatri, had come through with the land title search on this property. I frowned at the text, trying to place the homeowner’s name. Oh, fuck balls. I wasn’t being paid to save Charlotte Rose from making a really stupid mistake.
This was not my problem.
Charlotte Rose rubbed her elbow, red from where she’d smacked into the door, and bit her lip, eyes watery.
Grumbling, I turned off the camera and got out of Moriarty, also known as my car, using both hands to swing my poor stiff leg onto the concrete. Tucking my fingers into the armpits of my battered leather jacket, my breath misting the air, I limped over to the tiny backyard of the crime spree in progress.
“Yo, Cat Burglar Barbie,” I called out. “The jig is up!”
She froze for a second and then vanished into thin air.
I blinked, gaping at the empty space. “Charlotte Rose Scott, you get your butt back here this second and explain yourself, because you are not supposed to have magic!”
I’d done my due diligence before taking this case. Verified that she was a Mundane. No powers. Zero. Nada.
Except, apparently, she wasn’t. And now, thanks to this unpleasant and unforeseen magical development, I was about to get royally fucked by House Pacifica.
Charlotte Rose flickered back into view, just a fist with her middle finger extended. I mean, impressive control on invisibility magic, but what a little shit.
“Leave her alone!” Another girl about the same age, who spoke with a light musical accent, raced into the backyard. Her worn denim jacket had “Fuck the patriarchy” written in thick silver marker across the back and her dyed black hair showed the ragged edges of someone who’d cut it herself.
Interesting choice for a co-conspirator.
When Victoria Scott had hired me to spy on her kid who’d been “acting cagey” and therefore obviously had some drug habit, she’d casually sported a linen dress that cost more than my much-needed car repairs. We’d spent a grand total of twenty minutes together, all of them in her vanilla-scented Williams Sonoma kitchen with its neatly shelved cookbooks–written by obscure foodies–whose spines weren’t even cracked.
The Unlikeable Demon Hunter Collection: Books 1-6: A Complete Paranormal Romantic Comedy Series Page 178
